OK, I understand asking ye random scholars and gentlepeeps to translate twenty pages of scrawled Renaissance Latin from a mediocre res pdf is like asking for days of labor for free. Not cool. I withdraw that request. But there is ONE SINGLE WORD which would be awesome to understand here, in the Fasciculus rerum Geomanticarum: the likeness of the demon Cambea, starting in the top line of page 617 of the pdf.
Why? Because from the rest of the description I can tell Cambea is another name for Decarabia from the Pseudomonarchia Demonum. In that tome, it says he appears in the likeness of *. Literally it has an asterisk to nothing there, like maybe he appears in the likeness of a butthole. I believe the Ars Goetia in the Clavicula Salomonis interpreted that as a star, so it’s saying he appears in the form of a star.
However, the Geomanticarum is an older document and includes an actual word there! If we can translate it, we know what Decarabia is actually supposed to look like! Can you feel the excitement? Anyway, the word is divided between two lines with a –, and every way I try to transcribe it gives me nothing in google translate. Is it fanni? fairni? farns? sanni? sairni? I can’t tell, I’m not a classics major.
Enlighten me. Summon Decarabia. I’m beggin’ ya.
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The rest is something like “Great Count Cambea appears in the likeness of a (mystery word). He gives men knowledge of herbs and precious stones. He makes birds descend to the earth and stay with the exorcist, and (something) and (something) as if domesticated. (yadda yadda yadda) He has 20 legions under his dominion.”
Decarabia in the Ars Goetia: “The 69 spirit is called Decarabia, he appeareth in ye forme of a starre in ye Pentacle at first… his office is to discover ye vertues of hearbs and precious stones; and to make ye similitude of all Birds to fly before ye Exorcist, & to Tarry wth him, singing and Drinking as Naturall Birds doe, he governeth 30 Legions of spirits…”
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The only thing I can think of is fauus for honeycomb but the ending doesn’t look appropriate. Actually, I can’t make much of that smudge… Or maybe some noun form of the verb faueo to denote favorable?
The first bit looks like “fau”
The second bit looks like “ni”
So I suggest “fauni” – fauns, i.e. goat bottom and man-like top.
It looks to me like fau — mi. Maybe fau-ni, genitive singular?
With the f like in facit in the next line, and the u like in magnus.
Looks like your missing word is “fauni” to me – the genitive case of “faun” – the half-man, half-goat creature which the Greeks called a satyr. So:
“Cambea, the great count, appears in the likeness of a faun. He understands the powers of herbs and precious stones. He makes…”
YESSS! THANK YOU ALL!
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Is Cambea running in 2020? I’d prefer pretty much any viable candidate over Biden, but they have to have supernatural powers.
Cambea was born in Heaven, so is a foreign national. No dice.
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I suppose it’s too late to get Cambea naturalized?
Calm down people. Cambea is just here to make birds your friends ‘n’ such. Admittedly, a better platform than most of our politicians, but still…